Chapter Two

“It is unlikely you will have much to do with the more powerful incarnations. Pray you do not. Aside from the obvious dangers, they are quite capable of turning that underused excuse for a brain of yours into so much porridge.”

—Instructor, Guardian Council, to recruit, 1841

The next morning came far too soon. I blinked up at the ceiling for some time, running over the previous day’s events. No one had broken down the door in the night. Good. As long as the new government left us alone, I didn’t much care who held power. I supposed I ought to have more nationalist feeling on the matter, but the Guardians had picked me up too early to form such a sentiment—so early that English now came with more ease than my native French.

At last I crept out from under the covers and made myself presentable. I wanted a walk, no matter the number of soldiers at large in the city. Our attackers had not been soldiers, and I sincerely doubted any hunter had gotten a good look at my face.

It would be some time before they sent us a new incarnation to escort, so we all had some time to ourselves. Harold still slept—his snores were quite audible on the landing. Madame Eavers was doing something in the kitchen involving much clashing of pots. I winced at the din, and made my way out into the cool air without pausing by the kitchen. I didn’t want to be hauled back in to wash pots.

I was half asleep. I didn’t notice I had tucked my revolver into the pocket of my coat until I was some distance away from the house. I debated turning back. It might cause me trouble if I were stopped. I doubted I would be. Better to be armed than not.

Everything seemed more alive, the splashes of sunlight on slate brighter, the smells of smoke and manure stronger. This pleasant everyday world was a balm to the senses after the darkness and the wind. Even if, and this was a purely reflexive thought as I stepped out of the way, the newfangled steam-driven horses produced more smoke than was excused by their usefulness.

I paused in an alley, thinking I heard something odd. Instinct and long years of training bade me keep quiet. I leaned against the opposite wall and tucked my chin into my collar. It was a chilly day, and this alley had a light little breeze running through it. It made things colder, but I wasn’t inclined to complain.

I stood there for some time, wondering if I was being foolish. The sound had simply been out of place.

A sudden pounding of feet just outside of my alley brought me upright, pressed back against the wall. I hoped it was not the gendarmerie—the very last thing I needed was someone asking where I’d been last night. I didn’t even have my partner to guard my back.

They’d be around the corner in an instant. I reached for my revolver.

Not the police. A girl. A tiny, slender girl, running with her head down and her fists clenched. She slammed into me, and sent me reeling back against the wall before I could dodge. I reached to steady her—poor thing, she looked hardly more than twelve.

I swore, looking down at where her eyes should have been. They were covered by a bandage. She held a pair of scales in one hand, and a sword in the other. Her face was pretty rather than handsome, with a stern mouth and dark eyebrows. Damn it all, we’d just gotten rid of the last one!

She must have just manifested. Civil disturbances did tend to raise manifestation rates. They’d done up figures that showed it, but why the devil did I have to deal with one immediately? I was still half-asleep from our last goddamned rescue.

This one looked like an incarnation of Justice. She was unearthly beautiful, for one, and the blindfold, sword and scales identified her still more certainly. Apparent age and lack of wings proclaimed her a new manifestation. There was someone after her—shouts and cries in the street outside our alley. Duty called.

She turned to run again. I put a hand on her shoulder. “I’m a friend,” I told her, realizing I sounded anything but. I couldn’t feel too badly about that. I was as steady-nerved as any other man, but the prospect of engaging in a repeat of last night already was rather daunting. Besides, she’d been the one to run into me.

She wrenched away with inhuman strength, spat a curse at me and turned to flee. The first of her pursuers came round the corner, and I fired at him. He ducked back with a yelp. At least he wasn’t in uniform. He wasn’t National Guard, then. Good.

“Don’t be a fool,” I called after the incarnation. “I’m a friend, damn your eyes, a friend! Do you want to be marked?” A clatter of feet—I should have done better to shoot the bastard at the beginning. His friends had joined him. They were probably bounty hunters. If they’d been government boys, they’d be better prepared.

The incarnation hesitated, then deciding, turned, dropped the scales with a clatter in the street and raised the sword.

“Smart girl,” I muttered.

The hunters were upon us. The incarnation didn’t seem terribly good with her sword—none of the blows she struck hit anything. She had to be very recently manifested, within the past hour. I beat about with the revolver, ducking as the sword flashed by my head.

It was not the only time I nearly was killed by her, but her enthusiasm did have its advantages. Intimidated, our attackers fled, before either of us had to do much damage. I looked over to her, to see her grinning widely.

“We’ll have to work on your swordplay,” I told her.

She shrugged. “It worked. Thank you. I shall be on my way.”

“I’m a Guardian,” I said.

No sign of understanding, and I sighed, stripped off one glove and put my hand to hers. A long pause, as I looked at the end of the alley—the hunters might return at any instant—wishing she’d hurry up and learn what she needed to. If she didn’t, if she couldn’t… I’d heard of such incidents, a mistake in manifestation, not as uncommon as might be hoped. The incarnation in question often died soon. The direct contact, scandalous as it was, would let her poke about in my mind to satisfy herself as to my trustworthiness. She should be able to do at least that much.

It was surprising the gunshot hadn’t already drawn the attention of the police, but even now, the hunters might have paid them off. It wasn’t as if the gendarmerie didn’t have its hands full already.

Finally she removed her hand, and I shoved my now-icy fingers back into the glove with much relief. “Shall we go?”

She nodded, and I offered her my arm.

As we walked, she with her cold hand on my arm and probably looking out at the world through my mind, however dimly, I tried not to panic. I wished once again that I had never had the bad sense to sign up, and wondered what the hell I was supposed to do now. All the incarnations we guided to safety had been handed on to us from other Guardians. We had never had to deal with the training or education of a new incarnation, one who would have very little idea of what her powers were or what dangers awaited her. I would, of course, contact the Council immediately, but in the meantime? It would take at least three days to get a response, even by telegram. Quite aside from the hunters, she could well have the house down around our ears before then. Or we could all end up insane, if she were that powerful and didn’t know how to control it. In those potentially disastrous three days, everything would be on my head, as I was senior.

I had no other choice but to bring her back to the house. There were too many hunters about to do anything but. If she sprouted wings in the next day or so, that was when we’d really start worrying. Liberty had been within her third week of existence. Someone else had trained her to control her considerable powers. If Justice was as powerful as Liberty, there would be no one to train her, no one to teach her how not to use her powers to warp our perceptions to the point that all the residents of the house went stark staring mad.

All things considered, it was an uncomfortable walk back.

Justice hesitated before following me up the steps. I stopped as well, letting her get past her fears. She knew—at least, she should have known—neither I nor any of my compatriots meant her any harm, but at least she seemed cautious. Liberty had been anything but.

Then, stubborn chin setting, she stepped forward again. I bent and unlocked the door, pushed it open and stepped inside. I made sure to close it after me—no sense in letting anyone on the street see inside the house for a second more than they had to. Then I turned.

I stopped dead in the face of Madame and her pistols. “Madame,” I said very carefully, “if I didn’t know any better, I should feel quite unwelcome.”

“I heard two sets of feet,” she said. “Who is she?”

I stepped aside, and Justice, who had placed herself directly behind me on hearing the second voice, gulped and folded her hands in front of her.

“Oh,” said Madame. “I see.” She put the pistols down on the sideboard. “Relax, girl. You’re safe now. I’ll see to those scales and that…sword.”

“I’d like to keep the sword with me, thank you,” Justice said in a very small voice.

Madame gave me a look that spoke volumes about lack of manners, but only took the scales. Justice turned her head to me as if looking for reassurance, and I patted her arm. “It’s perfectly all right,” I said. “You’re safe now.”

“Safe from what?” she said, stepping away. “You’ve given no more than the slightest of explanations, sir, no more than a general reassurance I can trust you and that the men after me were evil.”

“You read me,” I said. “You do know that when you read a person, they cannot lie?”

“I do. It was enough to get me here. Who are you people and what do you want with me? You cannot be doing this out of charity.”

“We expect nothing from you,” I said. “Our duty is to protect people like you, those with unusual abilities.”

“Unusual abilities? Explain.”

I looked around, feeling resigned. “Would you like to sit down, miss? There’s no point to discussing this here. You must be tired.”

She looked suspicious, then shrugged, nodded.

“Right,” I said, and started down the hallway. I hoped Harold wouldn’t be in the parlor. The last thing we needed was this incarnation spooking. She had a sword. I didn’t want to be run through—she looked terribly nervous.

I waited for her to sit before settling down in one of the armchairs. It was overly soft, and I had to perch on the edge to keep from sinking. “You’re an incarnation,” I said. “You are a physical representation of a concept or ideal—in your case, Justice. You control and manipulate the perceptions of people around you.”

“I know,” said Justice. “I used it to stop one of the hunters. I made him feel it was wrong. The others I couldn’t affect.”

“Exactly,” I said, wondering again how powerful she was. To stop someone dead on the street… I had no clue of how to train her. We were doomed.

“Then what do you do?” She turned her face to me. I knew she couldn’t be looking at me, but I shifted uncomfortably all the same.

“We’re agents of the Guardian Council,” I said. “I’m the senior officer at this safe house. We keep those with unusual abilities protected.”

“From what?”

I was finding it harder and harder not to quote from the training book but that would sound trite and she was suspicious enough. One could hardly blame her. “You’re valuable. Do you know what a mark is?”

“No.”

“It’s a spell. A magician places it on you…” no need to give her all the details, she was a lady, after all, “and then you must obey any command the person who placed it on you, or the person they authorize, gives you. If you don’t, you may go mad or die horribly.”

The dark brows came together in concern, Justice’s hands clenching in her lap. “Why?”

“To control you. They can buy and sell you, and use you however they see fit. You could be forced to convince a court a murderer should walk free, even if he murdered in broad daylight on a busy street.” I ignored her immediate revulsion and went on, “Or people might wish to kill you. ‘Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live’ and all that.”

“You’ll protect me from that?”

“We will. It’s what we do. For both incarnations and others with…unusual abilities. Natural magicians and so on.”

“I thought you needed a magician to place the spell.”

“Magic is usually learned rather than inherent,” I said. “Natural magicians can cast spells without the need of any sort of instruction.”

Madame came back into the room with Harold in tow. “Mister Lambert, you are neglecting your report,” she said, and glanced at Justice. “This is Mister Harold Carlton. He will answer whatever further questions you have. Will you want anything to eat?”

“If you please,” said Justice, politely. “I am quite hungry.”

“Will you still be needing that sword?”

“No, madame.”

I struggled up out of the chair. “I’ll be back as soon as I may.”

I have never written a report so quickly in my life—though the novelty of actually reporting a manifestation was huge, the fear Harold might make some sort of misstep and terrify the girl haunted me. As soon as I’d finished it, I ran out to the old pigeon coop. Our neighbors would have been shocked to learn it was occupied, and even more so at the nature of its occupants. At least if the damned thing fell out of the sky, they would be unable to read any message attached—it would be in code. It would also be in English of course, but being in an educated neighborhood meant that would be no obstacle.

I stepped into the dark confines of the coop, shuddering at the thick close air around me. The smell of oil and of pigeon surrounded me, and the burbling, mindless cooing was obscenely loud in the confined space. Eager to get out, I seized one of the devices at random, got soundly pecked by the pigeon next to it, somehow managed to disentangle myself from the maddened bird, and staggered outside, clutching the metal skeleton in one hand. Its feathery covering was becoming worn in places, and it rattled as I put it down. It was a horrible object, and one of the real pigeons must have perched directly above it. I wiped my hand as best I could on the grass. Then I stuffed the message into its little container on the machine’s ‘leg’, and wound it. It made unpleasant creaking noises the entire time. They all did that, apparently, but I never was completely sanguine, and dreaded the day one of the devices failed midair. One wing caught me across the nose, and I threw it skyward, with more force than perhaps was strictly necessary. I have never liked clockwork pigeons.

I watched it out of sight, a small, white feathery thing that looked somewhat like a pigeon at this distance. A strong gust of wind followed it, bearing it further aloft. Then I went back into the house, desperately wanting to wash my hands. The aroma clung.

“The Council has been informed,” I told all three of them, as I passed, trailing loosened feathers and the smell after me. “Harold, come with me. We need to check the house.”

Harold nodded and got to his feet.

“Do you think she’s first-tier?” he asked some time later, on the roof, as we muscled a slate bearing an uncommonly powerful combustion spell into place. It was one of Madame’s own creations. Anyone climbing over the roof incautiously would burst into brief flames and then disintegrate into ash. It was one of seven spelled slates.

“I don’t think so,” I said, as we settled it into position, snugged between two of its fellows. I straightened up, pushing the hair out of my eyes. Smoke rose from another part of the city, across the river, and at a long distance, the pop-pop-pop of rifle fire, none of our concern. “At least, I hope not. I’ve no idea what we’re supposed to do to train her in the first place. If she’s got that kind of power, we’ll all be mad before I figure it out.”